It's pretty obvious that some of us, here, are a little too invested in the reputation of our Tundras and Toyota in general. If you actually believed that Toyota was so great that they could never build a less than reliable vehicle in the first model year then you had it coming. Why the hell would anyone buy a truck in the first model year for the reliability anyway?
Toyota is a huge multi-faceted company. The Tundra was obviously designed and built with the usual compromises inherent in the large truck market. I'm sure they have a corporate culture of quality, however, the days of the dutiful Japanese factory worker with the white gloves are long gone. I don't think they are going to be handing out the white robes and sharp knives at the factory for this. And, I don't think Tundra owners are gonig to be recieving a box of T-shirts or
floor mats to make up for the resale hit we just took, either.
None of this should be a surprise. The CR reliabilty ratings probably are a direct result of the surveys that were sent out. The results are probably divided between 2WD vs 4WD each in a different bin. I don't think they sat down and did an analysis of why they got back certain results for different models. They just published the results they got. That's the best protection against accusations of bias. For some reason, 4WD owners reported more problems than 2WD owners. Go figure.
The CR reports are unique in that the reliability ratings are based on actual user reports - not just on test drives by magazine staff. That's why it and JD Powers are so influential. If there is any criticism that can be leveled at the methodology it probably would be that the sample size and sample time period were probably too small.